Minimes

Minimes are what I call my very small (as small as 3 inches on a side) art quilts. I adopted the name from Sheila Hicks who calls her small weavings “minimes” from the French for “minimal” or something very small, very basic.

Minimes is also the name of a mendicant order of nuns and friars, for whom a church and street are named in the Marolles quartier of the oldest neighborhood of Brussels. One of my favorite parts of the city, rue des Minimes is near the marché aux puces in the Place du Jeu de Bal, where I sought old textiles and linen sheets to use in my work. The soft used cotton and linen cloth takes dye and paint beautifully.

My minimes also make use of scraps from my larger works. Creating textile art minimes is a way to concentrate on one or two aspects of my process and practice design on a small scale. When altering photos of figures, I often reduce the size and make small silkscreens to print as subjects of my minimes.

I find that floating a minime on a matboard base or fixing a minime behind a cut mat (a passepartout) is the best method for presentation.